Zombies hit Hill Country

Updated 6:22 pm, Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Zombies descend on Buck Wild ranch in the horror film "Buck Wild," which is part of the Hill Country Film Festival.

Zombies descend on Buck Wild ranch in the horror film "Buck Wild," which is part of the Hill Country Film Festival.

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Kristen Bell stars in "Stuck in Love," a dramedy directed by Josh Boone that's screening at the Hill Country Film Festival.

Kristen Bell stars in "Stuck in Love," a dramedy directed by Josh Boone that's screening at the Hill Country Film Festival.

Photo: Millennium Films

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Winona Ryder and Michael Shannon star in "The Iceman," which will open the Hill Country Film Festival.

Winona Ryder and Michael Shannon star in "The Iceman," which will open the Hill Country Film Festival.

Photo: Anne Marie Fox, Millennium Films

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The documentary "Somm" will be screened for competition.

The documentary "Somm" will be screened for competition.

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Meg Cionni stars in "Walking," which screens at the Hill Country Film Festival.

Meg Cionni stars in "Walking," which screens at the Hill Country Film Festival.

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The 2013 Hill Country Film Festival poster

The 2013 Hill Country Film Festival poster

Photo: Hill Country Film Festival

Zombies hit Hill Country

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If you didn't know that getting bitten by a chupacabra can turn you into a zombie and mess up your plans, you'll find out in the appropriately titled “Buck Wild,” a Texas zombie comedy playing at the Hill Country Film Festival in Fredericksburg this weekend. It's part of a four-day program of features and shorts marking the festival's fourth year.

Created in 2010 to showcase filmmakers from Texas and around the world, the Hill Country Film Festival this year is showing 56 films, including four features in competition and 49 shorts. It runs Thursday through Sunday.

“In 2010, when we started the film festival, it was pretty much just friends and family getting together and watching some movies over a weekend. It was really that small,” says Chad Matthews, the festival's executive director. “And over the years, it's grown into a considerable festival for the city of Fredericksburg.”

Because attendance has doubled every year, Matthews says they've been able to add a lot of things, such as panel discussions and a filmmakers lounge where people can talk movies and have a beverage.

“I knew it could be successful, but I didn't know it was going to grow this fast,” he says. “A lot of film festivals you read about, it takes them nine years, 10 years to really grab onto their community and get a solid foundation, and I feel like Fredericksburg's really welcomed us.”

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“Buck Wild” is part of a career homecoming for star and co-writer Matthew Albrecht, a graduate of Fredericksburg High School and Texas State University who moved to Los Angeles in 2006 and began hitting the audition trail. He got a role in the Oscar-winning “The Artist” as a tennis-playing actor in a film within the film. Most of it wound up on the cutting room floor, but he's still there.

“I did love being around so many talented creative people, but I was kind of tired of being broke,” says Albrecht, who at first worked under the name Matthew Philips because, he says, nobody in L.A. could pronounce Albrecht.

Meanwhile, he and director Tyler Glodt began writing scripts, and in 2008 they founded Conation Films with Christian Sosa. Their first horror project, “The Eves,” was shot on the thousand-acre ranch Albrecht's grandfather owned outside Goliad, south of Victoria.

“When you get out there, you look around and say, 'Well, there's only two genres you can do.' You can either shoot a western or something more with a horror aspect,” he says.

The ranch is leased to deer hunters, which gave them their next idea: Four clueless pals go hunting only to find themselves in a wild and woolly zombie weekend at the Buck Wild ranch. Albrecht and Glodt wrote the first outline on a napkin at the IHOP on Sunset Boulevard late in 2010, then raised a budget and went into production several months later.

Like “The Eves,” they're taking “Buck Wild” on the festival circuit while planning a new thriller, “Tres,” about three guys who get mixed up with Mexican drug cartels. “Buck Wild” premiered in Dallas and has so far played at fests in Seattle and Sydney, Australia. Coming up is the Fright Night fest in Louisville, Ky.

Albrecht moved back to Victoria last August and concentrates on these self-generated projects.

“I still have a love for acting, but now I'm in a different mode where I'm very interested in writing and producing,” he says. “And to be honest with you, I kind of always felt that's the best way to go about it anyway. When you're an actor, you get lost so much in the fold because everybody and anybody wants to be an actor.”

Thriller opens fest

The Hill Country Film Festival opens with two free screenings on Thursday.

At 8 p.m., the Fredericksburg Marktplatz hosts a family-friendly outdoor screening of several shorts, including “The Gruffalo's Child” from England, “The Boondi War” from Australia and Germany's “Hurdy Gurdy.” Donations to Goodwill Industries are encouraged, and visitors should bring their own chairs and blankets.

Short films from Texas filmmakers include Trish Dalton's “Southmost U.S.A.,” in which Brownsville residents discuss the border fence; Ryan Britton's “To Be Gray,” a take on sexuality in a black-and-white world; Kat Candler's “Black Metal,” the drama of a musician's crisis; and Bears Fonte's “The Secret Keeper,” set in an alternate future or past.

Other shorts include several animations, half a dozen documentaries, many comedies and dramas (including this year's Oscar-winning “Curfew”) and even a western. Though most are from the U.S., they hail from as far away as New Zealand, Brazil, Argentina, Ireland, Germany, Italy and Sweden.

Besides “Buck Wild,” three features screen in competition:

“Somm”: Jason Wise's documentary on candidates for the title of Master Sommelier, which means passing a blind wine-tasting test.